Soundwave
Soundwave is the debut full-length album by American metalcore band Skynet. It was released in 2010 through Fearless Records.. With anticipation of the album following up to their critically acclaimed EP Dragon Spell, the band promoted the album for several months until leading to its release. It was produced by Andrew Wade and Travis Darren and is the last release by the band with vocalist Mike McBriar. A deluxe edition of the record was released in 2011 and features bonus content consisting of four remixed tracks along with one cover of Mercy by Kanye West. Background With anticipation of their full-length debut album after releasing the EP, Dragon Spell during the previous year, Skynet began work on Soundwave. It was recorded in 2009 in Washington, DC with producer Andrew Wade. Guitarist, Raylan Westbrook explained that "The tracking was a lot of fun and everyone had a good time." Mike McBriar noted that "We wanted to step it up in every aspect of our songs compared to Dragon Spell. When we're heavy, it's heavier. When we do things big, they are huge! When we slow it down, it's something beautiful." "Ascension" was released as the album's first single where it was premiered online. The second single, "Shadow King" premiered on the Revolver website. The album features a re-recording of the song "Hyperion", originally featured as the opening track for Dragon Spell. A deluxe edition of Soundwave was released in 2011 and contains one cover song; "Mercy". It also features remixes of the songs "Shadow King", "Kill the Reaper", and "Rifter", with "Shadow King" being exclusively remixed by Limp Bizkit guitarist Wes Borland along with an unreleased music video for "Kill the Reaper" as well as the "Rifter" music video. For the convenience of fans that were already in-possession of the hardcopy release of Soundwave, the release of the deluxe edition was only made digitally over iTunes. All extras included on the deluxe edition are available individually. Reception Soundwave received overwhelmingly positive reviews by many. Allmusic explained that the album "covers a lot of familiar territory. Where the album gets interesting is in the guitar acrobatics of Raylan Westbrook and Cal Michaels, who like to keep things lightning fast and intricate" and "for anyone looking for metalcore with a couple of surprises here and there, Soundwave should offer a little something new." Alternative Press stated "the relentless drive of so many of the songs found on Soundwave have an urgency and added aggression to them that would make many of their peers recoil out of fear." Nathan Lay of SMN News expressed that "this is one of those albums that actually becomes increasingly better as it plays through. It seems that most albums lose steam by the time they’re half way through, but not Soundwave." Lay also garnered a comparison of the album to their Dragon Spell EP by stating "Hell, the EP is still a worthy metal contender with today’s releases. So how does the full length compare? Well fans can stop holding their breath; Soundwave is beast. It’s heavier, more intricate, more powerful, and even more aggressive (lyrically and musically)." Negative reviews or comments of the album were made in dislike to the album's clean (melodic singing) vocals. Lambgoat referred to the singing as "Estrogen enhanced emo vocals" and gave it a negative review while stating "Just when you think they've sunk to the deepest depths of commercial mall-metal, the fast guitar flurries are re-re-remixed with stupid sounding synths." Sales Soundwave reached position 12 on the ''Billboard'' 200, number 3 on Rock Albums, number 2 on Top Independent Albums, and number 3 on Hard Rock Albums. Track listing Personnel ;Skynet *Malcolm Davidson - unclean vocals *Mike McBriar - clean vocals *Raylan Westbrook - lead guitar, vocals, co-lead vocals in "My Respite" *Cal Michaels - rhythm guitar *Eric O'Brien - bass guitar *Tyler Mace - drums *Travis Darren - synthesizers, keyboards, programming, production ;Production *Produced by Andrew Wade and Travis Darren